The First Concorde Crash was Soviet

[Music] at its peak the anglo-french Concorde was the epitome of technological prowess in super sleek design in 20th century aviation it was considered the most beautiful commercial plane the world had ever seen and being the West's first supersonic jet it was also the fastest of its era however the Concorde was not the first supersonic plane to make it to market this honor went to a Soviet aircraft that reached supersonic speed in months before the Concorde and one that briefly became the pride of the USSR before its ultimate failure the communist version of the concorde was the tupolev tu-144 and it was the first passenger aircraft to fly at more than twice the speed of sound the tupelov's first flight occurred three months before the Concorde took to the air on March 2nd 1969 but the tu-144 which was dubbed Concorde ski by Western observers for its similarities to its Western rival never became quite as popular it was perhaps most notable as the first commercial supersonic plane to have a crash landing which it did not once but twice [Music] the supersonic race like many of the great technological feats of the Cold War political rivalry was at the heart of the tu-144 story the Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev became aware in 1960 of a new supersonic aircraft project being undertaken by Britain and France the plane that would become the concorde was conceptualized as a passenger aircraft designed to fly at supersonic speeds cutting the time it would take to fly from Europe to the US - just a few hours fighter planes like the Soviet Union's mig-21 and the u.s. is f-104 were already capable of flying at twice the speed of sound so commercial supersonic travel seemed a viable if daunting task Khrushchev immediately demanded that the Soviets develop a similar aircraft only needed to be quicker than Concorde and completed first the allure of beating the West to the punch superseded any protocols for safety or craft this was the height of the Cold War and his choclo a former concorde pilot observed there was the space race and the race to put a man on the moon happening at the same time the USSR this rapid industrialization and considerable successes in the space race in the early 1960s had emboldened Soviet leaders convincing them that the country needed to take on even more impressive projects to outdo the West the technological and scientific expectation to the Soviet elites were immense the tu-144 project simply had to succeed such was its importance to the Soviet leadership the catch was that the space race had shifted Soviet focus to long-range rockets and high-altitude missiles therefore the tu-144 had to be developed separately as a standalone civil aircraft program a problematic plane as if the Soviet engineers weren't under enough pressure already the supersonic aircraft had to also present a comfortable experience for passengers and be economically viable these requirements were unfamiliar to the Soviet aviation industry and offered a unique challenge the tu-144 as designed was undoubtedly bigger than the concorde it was over 215 feet in length almost 12 feet longer than its Western rival it would be able to cruise at just over Mach 2 or 1340 miles per hour and each of its four engines could generate more than 44,000 pounds of thrust each but for six thousand pounds more thrust from each engine the Concorde could achieve however several problems plagued the tu-144 s development including issues with the plane's brakes and engine control system for example their brakes could not withstand the enormous heat generated when trying to slow the aircraft after landing being more powerful meant that the 244 needed more lift and power to get it into the air part of its weight problem was its enormous undercarriage it required no less than 12 wheels underneath its wings partly because Russian tires were made of synthetic rubber and were more prone to failure the Soviets circumvented some of these issues with its most distinctive feature which was a pair of winglets or canards located right behind the cockpit his winglets provided extra lift and improved handling at low speeds first in the air the tu-144 first took flight in December 1968 and flew it's supersonic speed for the first time in June 1969 the Concorde would not take to the air until March 1969 and it did not go supersonic until October 1969 when the Soviets unveiled two tu-144 at the Paris Air Show in 1971 everyone was impressed the French President George Pompidou called it quote a beautiful plane even the makers of concorde conceded that the soviet supersonic planes seemed quote quieter and cleaner ilya Grinberg a soviet aviation expert an engineering professor would say this about the soviet plane quote expectations were high the entire USSR was extremely proud of the tu-144 and the Soviet people had no doubt that it was better than Concorde and it was so pretty however some Western observers suspected foul play leaving that the only way the Soviet Union could have devised the tu-144 was through industrial espionage the to 144 was patronizingly dubbed the Concorde ski in an effort to diminish it as a carbon copy of the Concorde albeit with cruder Soviet touches it is true that the tu-144 was heavily influenced by Concorde however its engine configuration for example was notably different the tu-144 alter needed to be more rugged to cope with tougher operating conditions in the Soviet Union it may have resembled the Concorde but differed quite substantially in refinement and detail [Music] dateline disaster the 1973 paris air show the soviets planned to unveil an updated version of the tu-144 on June 3rd 1973 at the Paris Air Show the Soviet plane was to go head-to-head at the show against a prototype by Concorde at the time the Concorde had still not gone into production tu-144 test pilot Mikhail Kozlov apparently taunted the concorde team by saying quote just wait until you see us fly then you'll see something the Soviet crew was Intendant surpassing Conchords flying display from the day before which had been somewhat cautious the specific aircraft involved was tupolev tu-144 s CCCP 7-7 102 manufacturers serial number zero one - - that aircraft had first flown on March 29th 1972 although it had been significantly modified it featured engine housings or nacelles split on either side of the fuselage with landing gears retracted into the nacelles and retractable canards the tu-144 had taken off from labora airport and approached the runway as if to make a landing with its nose dropped and its undercarriage down the landing gear was out and the candidates clearly extended but something was off the crowd watched in awe as the plane then climbed suddenly and rapidly with all four of its engines at full power seconds later tragedy struck the plane likely stalled just below 2,000 feet pitched over and then went into a steep dive with the pilots desperately trying to pull out of the dive and the engines again at full power the tu-144 broke up in midair the left wing breaking off first possibly due to over stressing of the airframe the aircraft disintegrated further and crash dived into the nearby village of a goose avila destroying fifteen houses in the process all of the drama took place in front of 250,000 people including the planes famous designer alexei tupelov [Music] why did Concord ski crash there were several theories as to why the tu-144 crashed one theory was that the pilot had maneuvered too hard at slow speed causing the plane to lose lift and thus stall another theory was that in a heated there extreme rivalry with the anglo-french Concord the Soviet pilots had attempted a manoeuvre that was beyond the aircraft's capabilities Bob Hoover a pilot for America's failed supersonic bell x-1 program firmly believed that the rivalry between the tu-144 and concorde is what led the soviet pilot of the tu-144 to attempt deadly manoeuvre Illya Grinberg would state how quote the Soviet pilots attempted to impress the public and the world's press to show that the Soviet plane could be sexier than the more conservative display of the Concorde that's quite clear from the footage also among the rumors cloudy conditions that day may have confused the crew the plane had to swerve to avoid a French Mirage fighter jet it was flying too close in order to take pictures at the tupelov's front canards which were advanced for their time and the Conchords anglo-french design team had deliberately passed on flawed blueprints at their plane because they believed the soviets would try to steal them all have mostly been disproven a limping bird the crash only highlighted the many issues with tupelov's pioneering design and so tupolev had to fix a myriad of problems before the aircraft could be signed off for service with the state airline Aeroflot it was only in 1977 that the tu-144 started transporting passengers in the end the Soviets tag on the Concorde was not a success it was considered especially cramped several ceiling panels were ajar service trays stuck and window shades dropped without being pulled worst of all the engines and air-conditioning units both created enormous noise made worse by the plane's ability to only be able to sustain supersonic speeds by using very loud afterburners passengers described the noise as quote an ear-shattering roar that made conversation impossible passengers would relate how they can only communicate with each other in the cabin by passing notes as Jonathan Clancy wrote in his book Concorde quote a flight on the tu-144 was not for those with sensitive hearing many technical issues plagued the tu-144 flights ranging from sudden depressurization to engine failure to blaring alarms that couldn't be switched off perhaps very tellingly each flight from Moscow could only depart after the aircraft had been personally inspected by the planes designer Alexei tupolev himself air afloat only used the tu-144 to serve the rather obscure to our route between Moscow and Al Motta than the capital of Kazakhstan it was chosen because it passed over sparsely populated areas but the weekly flights were mostly half empty and the plane ended up transporting more cargo and Mail than people the service was finally canceled after only 55 returned flights the project was lightly delivered its deathblow on may 23rd 1978 when disaster struck again a commercial tu-144 flight caught fire near moscow and made an emergency landing the accident prompted a complete ban on passenger flights of the tu-144 but by then Soviet leaders had already had enough of the costly and problematic program [Music] sunset on supersonic flights the tu-144 is production officially ended in 1982 by contrast the concorde became a brief success in the West the thousands of transcontinental flights flown by Air France and British Airways even the Concorde was eventually met with a similar fate despite his more illustrious career and sparkling safety ratings on July 25th 2004 during takeoff at Paris's Charles de Gaulle Airport when a piece of runway debris blew out the plane's tires and punctured its fuel tank the Concorde went up in flames in an eerie bit of symmetry the 2000 Concorde crash happened just nine miles from where the first tu-144 crashed in June 1973 [Music]

Channel: Dark Docs

Views: 5,431,957

Rating: 4.7571969 out of 5

Keywords: soviet, soviet concorde, concorde, concorde flight, ussr, airplane, aircraft, air show, concordski, paris air show, aviation, tupolev, tu-144, tupolev tu-144, sst, tu144, aeroplane, history, dark docs, documentary, history channel, history channel documentary, engineering, science, technology, education, plane, vehicle, russia, aviation history, supersonic transport, crash

Id: v_-bW8F7E6M

Length: 13min 5sec (785 seconds)

Published: Sat Jul 06 2019